Help: Mortgage broker fraud, his accountants office turns out to be sex shop!

javir

Help please

My dad got a re-mortgage, at the time he was desperate for money. He asked a 'mortgage broker' to help him get a re-mortgage.

I don't know what my dad was thinking, but this broker asked him to sign a 'blank' piece of paper, and then told him don't worry I'll get you a loan.

The loan was with Commercial First Ltd, after signing the mortgage agreement the money was released; £440,000 and £421,120 went to the current lender at the time with whom my dad was having financial problems.

After paying the lender, £18,880 was left for my dad, but this is when this broker sent an invoice to my dad for £18,500, on that 'blank' piece of paper signed by my dad, this amount was not mentioned before the mortgage was finalised.

I don't want to make this too long but after some research it turns out this 'broker' did not even have a brokers license, and he sent false accountants papers to the Commercial first, and when i went to his accountants offices it turned out to be a sex shop who had been there for the last 18 years!

This happened about 3 years ago, the property was repossessed and sold off, can my dad get compensation?

Any info is dearly appreciated
Thankyou

ILW

Who would you expect him to get compensation from?

javir

I'm not sure, i would hope from the lender Commercial First.

Either under the law against misrepresentation, or for damages caused by the fraudulent doings of the so called 'broker'.

I'm completely in the dark here....

opinions4u

Dad was already having problems.

He borrowed the money.

The problems continued.

Would the outcome have been any different without the dodgy broker?

(I'm not in any way defending the broker, but Dad has presumably allowed fraudulent declarations to be made on his behalf. Effectively obtaining money by deception).

_Andy_

So your Dad commits fraud and you think he should be compensated? Genius!!

dunstonh

The loan was with Commercial First Ltd,

Didnt they only do commercial lending? If so, then its unregulated.

after some research it turns out this 'broker' did not even have a brokers license

How do you know this? Its actually quite hard to find out if a mortgage adviser is authorised. For example, they dont appear on the FSA register.

can my dad get compensation?

Who from? Lender isnt responsible. The broker wasnt a broker so consumer protection doesnt apply.

Plus, your dad already had that debt. Changing the lender just transfers it from one hand to the other. He would have still owed the money whether he did the transaction or not and the outcome would have been the same.

javir

No my dad did not declare any false information i.e. false income or any other type of fraud.

And yes it was a commercial re-mortgage, meaning its unregulated, but doesnt a broker/adviser have to have a license to operate off premises?

And how i know that he doesnt have a license is because this matter is currently in county the courts and upon being ordered to provide a brokers license he admitted that he doesnt have a license, nor has he ever had one.

Again 'no' fraud/misinformation was committed by my father.

So please any constructive info, theres a big difference between changing lender for lower interest rates etc, and having your property reposessed after being grossly deceived by a criminal masquerading as a financial adviser.....

_Andy_

So you're telling me

"but this broker asked him to sign a 'blank' piece of paper, and then told him don't worry I'll get you a loan."

and your Dad thought "yep, that seems legit"..c'mon..

opinions4u

javir wrote: »

No my dad did not declare any false information i.e. false income or any other type of fraud.

And yes it was a commercial re-mortgage, meaning its unregulated, but doesnt a broker/adviser have to have a license to operate off premises?

And how i know that he doesnt have a license is because this matter is currently in county the courts and upon being ordered to provide a brokers license he admitted that he doesnt have a license, nor has he ever had one.

Again 'no' fraud/misinformation was committed by my father.

So please any constructive info, theres a big difference between changing lender for lower interest rates etc, and having your property reposessed after being grossly deceived by a criminal masquerading as a financial adviser.....

You haven't explained why the broker's action led to repossession.

If your Dad was benefiting from lower rates, how come he couldn't meet the payments?

As I asked in post #4 "Would the outcome have been any different without the dodgy broker?"

Did the broker send "false accountants papers" on behalf of your Dad? Why was Dad unable to provide his own information?

If they were falsified, and matched up to the income declared on the mortgage application form, that suggests Dad agreed to the fraud in someway (either by signing without checking or by providing an inflated figure).

dunstonh

Again 'no' fraud/misinformation was committed by my father.

signing blank forms for someone else to fill in leads to that. Also, you cant falsify accountants letters and accounts unless you completely forge them.

S

o please any constructive info, theres a big difference between changing lender for lower interest rates etc, and having your property reposessed after being grossly deceived by a criminal masquerading as a financial adviser.....

You said earlier it was a mortgage broker. Now you say its a financial adviser. Which is it? (different rules apply to each). are you saying they were authorised but bad or not authorised at all?

And how i know that he doesnt have a license is because this matter is currently in county the courts and upon being ordered to provide a brokers license he admitted that he doesnt have a license, nor has he ever had one.

There isnt a licence to produce. You are either authorised or you are not. The only possible licence is a consumer credit licence. However, many mortgage advisers dont have those as since the FSA took on regulation you dont need them for first charge mortgages. Also, in this case, as clarified, it is a commercial mortgage.

And yes it was a commercial re-mortgage, meaning its unregulated, but doesnt a broker/adviser have to have a license to operate off premises?

no.

Stripping it all away, what do you hope to achieve? If a crime has been committed then it makes your father a victim of crime. However, that doesnt mean he can get compensation from anyone else. If the "broker" was not a broker and not authorised then there is no consumer protection and your dad isnt a consumer either as it was a commercial arrangement.

jamesd

Why on earth would Commercial First have to pay any compensation? They are the only pure victim here, apparently being scammed into making a loan they might not otherwise have made, via the use of false documents. Trying to get money out of them would just result in them passing the fraud case to the police for prosecution.

Redress for mortgage mis-selling is limited to the loss sustained, comparing the original position to the situation after the sale. I don't see any prospect of a loss here, since it appears that repossession was going to happen both before and after the deal.

A 4.3% fee wouldn't have been greatly out of order for a sub-prime lending case of substantial difficulty, which is what your father's situation seems to have been. It only looks like a lot because of the loan size, not because it was unreasonable for even a legal service, let alone the criminal one that was actually purchased.

There was apparently application fraud. Your father can't pursue it because the signature will demonstrate that your father was part of the fraud and that this is just a falling out between criminals, both of whom could end up prosecuted. Even if the signature was on a blank piece of paper that would be sufficient for him to be considered a knowing participant.

Your father avoided criminal prosecution and jail time. He already got lucky.